Poll: Does the past truely effect the future?

[Deleric]

Of course it does. Prevent the meteor from hitting Earth a trillion years ago, it's your fault when you come back and get eaten by dinosaurs.

And I think the Past/Future relation in Mass Effect was not brought upon as a pure gameplay mechanic, moreso just them not having enough time or money to program a story mechanic that deep.

 

[floppylobster]

(1) It's not possible to go back into the past.
(2) The future does not exist.
(3) There is only now and the memory of 'past nows' available to us.
(4) Humans try to use their memory of the past to predict 'the future' but in fact the whole time they are doing this they are still located in the present. Furthermore, once they make a decision on the 'future' they can only do one thing and only one thing only so despite the appearance of multiple outcomes only one ever eventuates.
(4a) Any speculation or hypothetical scenarios about 'what if' and 'I should have done this' only end up taking up more moments of the present.
(6) The present is the only moment that exists and the only moment in which you can do anything.

I am playing Mass Effect now so even though the game is old a spoiler warning would be nice.

 

[Hexenwolf]

Noooo. If you kill Hitler are you saying Hitler will still be alive anyway and do he was going to do?

You're missing the point.
He's asking if there is some action, some tiny action, that if changed or altered slightly, wouldn't change the future/present...

OT: Personally, though, I'm not sure...
You're probably right about that "eating a different" sandwich idea... Can anyone correct me as to how his example of:

... If I went back in time a day ago and had a turkey sandwich instead of a Peanut butter and Jelly...

would change the future?

There probably is some way it could change it, possibly. I'm curious now...

Theoretically, if he spent a different amount of time preparing the sandwich (since PB&J is so much easier to make) then maybe he would be in a slightly different place. Maybe instead of being exactly on time to class or work, he would be late, which could have other repercussions, etc. etc. Realistically though, I seriously doubt that such a minor change would have any real effects. Possible though. If you're persistent enough, you can think of a way for any change, no matter how minor, to majorly affect the future. The probability of such a thing happening however... well, let's just say just because something can happen doesn't mean it will. Ugh, I'm repeating myself.


P.s. I see certain people mistaking "effect" with "affect." That bothers me quite a lot.

 

[firedfns13]

He who controls the past commands the future. He who commands the future conquers the past.

Who said this?

Kane from Command and Conquer.

I knew it! Only a badass such as he could say something like that.

 

[park92]

don't mess with the past you dun want red alert to actually happen lol

 

[Laxman9292]

This questions has been burdening me for months. Is it possible to go back in time and do something that will not effect the future? If I went back in time a day ago and had a turkey sandwich instead of a Peanut butter and Jelly will the president die? If I went to work in a short sleeve instead of a long sleeve shirt back in 1999, will Ralph Nader win the election? While these events are obviously hyperbole I cant think of a situation where the future will truly be the same if something in the past changes.

But then a game called mass effect came along, spouting ideas that your past consequences will effect the future. Theoretically no matter what your decisions were in that game, it will still be the same story in the end. While I shouldnt be comparing real life to a game, it does have some truth in it. Movies constantly use time travel and we always see major consequences, but there has to be one action that is without consequence, Right?

Your misuse of the "affect/effect" duo in the past when you wrote the post has colored my future opinion of the intelligence of this thread. Therefore every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Physics is fun!

 

[stabnex]

To everyone who answered No: agents have been dispatched to your homes to murder you and your entire bloodline because you have finally proven your worth as living beings. I'll give you a hint. It's less than 1.

 

[havass]

All actions have reactions, it all depends on how large the potential reaction is for the action you plan to do.

So if you prepare a turkey sandwich, it wouldn't change much since it is such a minor action.

My theory anyway.

Also, a lot of movies have retarded time-travel stories.

But what if the turkey you use was going to be used by someone else....who now has to buy a different filling and gets killed on the way to the store because they did not have said filling because you have it?
Stuff like this intrigues me. Just stepping off a kerb or catching a different bus can have ramifications.

my thoughts exactly. and the time you take to make and eat the turkey sandwich would go into doing something else, which leads to more and more things. any minor thing can affect the future. lets say abraham lincoln decided to move a few steps to his right or left and didnt get assassinated. the few steps were a minor thing, but abraham lincoln continuing living is a very huge event.

 

[Oomii]

Yes, maybe not in a day but over time it will greatly. Lets use that sandwich example. You use turkey which may take slightly longer to prepare then a peanut butter one. So your a little later to , lets say a movie. Which could cause you to miss your friend who was standing in line, who if you caught him you might of talked and seen a different movie. Which could greatly affect a conversation and that could lead to you seeing that movie. Which takes away 2 hours, and well you see how far this could go.

Now something that small probably wouldn't affect things so much, most of that was and exaggeration. You might not even experience any difference in your life time. However it would definitely affect things in the long run. A small air difference or a bit of turkey in the land fill can go a long way.

 

[irishstormtrooper]

No, because time travel will never work. Time is a human invention. There is no going back or forward, it just exists. Your choices have no effect on the future because there is no future. There is now, the future, and the past, and only one can be affected.

 

[Ctrl Alt 1337]

If you went back to 1945 and killed some local in Hiroshima 10 seconds before the bomb dropped, would there be a consequence?

 

[The Madman]

Oy, Time Travel.

Look, time travel is a paradox. It is impossible for this very simple reason: If you were to travel back in time to change something, the thing you'd have changed would never have happened and you wouldn't have had a reason to change it in the first place so you'd never have traveled back in time.

It's the classic time paradox, and it's been debated by men and women much, much smarter than anyone in this topic including myself. General consensus? Impossible. And I'll go with what they say over video-game logic.

 

[Ziltoid]

This questions has been burdening me for months. Is it possible to go back in time and do something that will not effect the future? If I went back in time a day ago and had a turkey sandwich instead of a Peanut butter and Jelly will the president die? If I went to work in a short sleeve instead of a long sleeve shirt back in 1999, will Ralph Nader win the election? While these events are obviously hyperbole I cant think of a situation where the future will truly be the same if something in the past changes.

But then a game called mass effect came along, spouting ideas that your past consequences will effect the future. Theoretically no matter what your decisions were in that game, it will still be the same story in the end. While I shouldnt be comparing real life to a game, it does have some truth in it. Movies constantly use time travel and we always see major consequences, but there has to be one action that is without consequence, Right?

of course a change of sandvich would make a difference!!

A peanut butter sandvich almost always begs for a glass of milk
wit the extra time drinking that milk you leave the house that much later
this means that your behind the schedule of the universe, a mugger is that much likely to meet you

a drunk driver is that much more likely to be driving when you are crossing the road

THE POSSIBILITY ARE ENDLESS

QFT. Sometimes the smallest things can have a huge impact.

 

[Veylon]

Time travel is impossible for good and excellent reasons. However....

Any past change would have consequences, minimal at first, and random over time. Maybe you eat your turkey sandwich, and someone else doesn't get that turkey, doesn't let it sit around, and doesn't get sick and die from food poisoning. Someone who becomes important and changes things. Or maybe he gets another pack and your change essentially means nothing.

Changing the past is like shouting at a mountain; sometimes nothing happens and sometimes you get an avalanche. The louder the shout, the more likely the effect.

 

[Lonan]

The past is the present, the present is the future.

 

[War Penguin]

Yes, every little thing you do has an effect on what you do. Every little action has consequences. Sure, that little action's consequence may not be big, but it's an action non the less.

 

[The_Deleted]

If you went back to 1945 and killed some local in Hiroshima 10 seconds before the bomb dropped, would there be a consequence?

There would be for you... you'd never get back in time and fracture any timeline you've affected from your birth.

 

[bodyklok]

Ahh; the limitless wonders of Cause and Effect: When you do something to something something will happen. I'm not sure that you're really clear on what you're asking here, I know I'm not. But assuming you just want to know weather or not time travel will affect the future then the answer is

Spoiler

Maybe.

I don't believe in destiny. I think that every cause has an effect and thus if you go back in time and cause something (like eating a sammich) it will have an effect; if you want to know what that effect will be they I can't tell you because there are some many variables. However, if you killed Hitler then if would have a very large effect on history.

What I'm fucking trying to say is that if fucking depends on what you do.

But then a game called mass effect came along

Actually this has been around for awhile.

 

[Dr. UBAR]

Most of you are assuming a cause and effect timeline. Try to imagine a effect then a cause. Oh wait they are interchangeable. That's modern physics for you. Making Star Trek look primitive since 1970!

 

[Biosophilogical]

Ever heard that little saying about a butterfly and a tornado ... good, because I forgot it, but regardless, the point is, if you have a different type of sandwich, it might change your mood that day (ever so slightly) and you might make someone else happier by being cheerful, who might make a good meal for dinner making his wife happy, meaning they don't get divorced, they then decide to start a bakery which becomes insanely popular among politicians, then, because it is such a hotspot, it gets bombed to kill some politicians. So then, after all that, you ended up getting a bunch of people killed because you had a different sandwich (maybe not that exact series of events, but you get what I mean, a slight difference can have a domino effect and, given time, can change the entirety of the future).